Uniting Idaho: A Small Newspaper Serves Hispanic Populations in Distributed Rural Areas

Abstract

Print-media needs of Hispanics in non-metropolitan areas of America are often overlooked. One newspaper editor in Idaho found Hispanics to be invisible in her small community and its newspaper, except in crime reports. So she began publishing the bilingual Idaho Unido. This study addresses the publisher's business model and motivation for publication. It is based on two research streams: theories of the press from Siebert, Peterson, and Schramm in 1956 through McQuail in 2005 and cultural maintenance perspectives. The Idaho Unido story represents a revelatory case, demonstrating the power of a motivated individual to essentially subvert the dominant media paradigm by creating a successful, independent publication specifically intended to serve the information, entertainment and cultural-identity needs of a small, marginalized population living in widely distributed rural areas.